Since waving goodbye to second year I've been spending my time researching, researching and sometimes playing outside in the mud (festival season is here!)
Sticking with all things kid I worked with The City Gallery at Riverside Festival in Leicester. These photos were taken before the kids let loose.. after 12 hours of making cardboard tunnels and playing with glitter, spagetti, rice crispies etc... it didn't look as neat. It was really sunny and very busy, but way more fun than being indoors and serving coffee to snooties.
I've also stumbled across a new favourite website, Pinterest! It's brilliant and my flatmates would tell you it's been the highlight of my life recently. The idea is creatives across the globe 'pin' images they find online (or take themselves) onto boards.. pretty much like a never-ending moodboard. It's really helpful for me as not only does it mean I can find lots of lovely photographs of lots of lovely things (not just design related, there's FOOD too.. bakers haven) but it also means I don't have to save and write down every thing I find and want to print out/remember for later (the images are saved with a link to where there from, also giving makers credit!). If you join look me up and we can share our finds over the big world wide web.
I'd post all the things I've found that have sparked thoughts for my design for children range, but to save space take a look on my Pinterest... there's a whole board dedicated to nursery finds. To give an idea of what's inspiring me here's a nice bullet-pointed list of notes I've been making on a sticky...
BABYWARE: The creative adult is the child who survived
- estimated market value.. £630 million a year! - BBC Britain's next big thing
- wall decals!!!..themes: balloons, dolls house, bunting, interaction & learning - height, the world, cloud & drops, gardens, jigsaw.. back-drop for ceramic wall hangings? photo frames,spelling cards, taxidermy theme, wall lighting.. dwellstudio
- ceramic mobiles - flat shapes to keep light, fitted with lighting, origami folding
- baby blocks - names, letters, shapes, learning blocks.. any other forms
- pull toys
- dolls house & characters
- russian nesting dolls - taking any form: animals, bears, giraffe,
- miniature woodlands, towns
- toy kitchen - toddlers/kids
- spelling cards - wall mounted, detachable, printed ceramics & collections theme!.. vintage, past baby products, scattered plates
- teepees!
To give me some help I've approached a friend at Nottingham Contemporary, she works as community programmer and runs the galleries programme for familes and kids. She's offered me a brief to create something that could fit and be used in their family room, hopefully this will give me a chance to test out my ideas over the summer and also get me involved with a gallery in Nottingham. Check back for more on that over the next few weeks, I have a lot of brainstorming/thought-showers to do.
I'll leave you with something to watch. The website of a book I've found called 'Kid Made Modern' has a KMM TV section with videos showing how modern design can be used to inspire kids activities. To my delight there's a few Marimekko related ones and a free style forts tutorial inspired by Charles and Ray Eames (which I could have done with watching before Riverside Festival... our forts were no where near as sturdy) Of course I had to share... remember kids, it's good to share.
